Kazakhstan Mulls Building Second Nuclear Power Plant

Central Asia’s largest nation might construct a second nuclear energy plant (NPP) after development begins on the primary one.

This assertion got here from Kazakhstan’s deputy vitality minister Zhandos Nurmaganbetov at a press convention on the Central Communications Service (CCS) on Wednesday.

“If Kazakhstan has set a course for carbon neutrality then there isn’t a different selection however to assemble a number of nuclear energy vegetation,” Nurmaganbetov stated.

Nurmaganbetov believes that the Irtysh River in northeastern Kazakhstan is a perfect location for the development of the brand new NPP from a technical viewpoint.

“The second nuclear energy plant in Kazakhstan will possible be constructed within the neighborhood of the city of Kurchatov on the financial institution of the Irtysh River,” he stated.

Kazakhstan is ranked because the world’s greatest uranium producer, holding about 12 p.c of the world’s recoverable uranium sources. Nuclear safety has all the time been a prime precedence for the federal government in Nur-Sultan. Not one of the nation’s uranium has been used to generate electrical energy for many years. Kazakhstan opened a facility in 1973 to provide electrical energy and desalinate water. Nonetheless, in 1999 the ability closed its doorways after the Kazakhstani authorities joined the worldwide nonproliferation regime.

Kazakhstan provides aggressive benefits for the event of nuclear vitality, which is taken into account inexperienced know-how because it doesn’t generate any carbon emissions.

Kazakhstanis have been discussing the development of a nuclear energy plant since 1997. Final 12 months, Kazakhstan’s President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev urged the vitality officers to not shelve the problem. He stated that the choice to construct a nuclear energy plant within the nation must be made anyway, irrespective of how unpopular it could be. Final September, Tokayev ordered the federal government and Samruk-Kazyna Nationwide Wealth Fund to comprehensively examine the opportunity of growing a nuclear energy trade in Kazakhstan. In accordance with the president, by 2030, Kazakhstan will face an influence scarcity.

After deciding on the location for the development of a nuclear energy plant, Kazakh authorities are learning the applied sciences of potential suppliers. In accordance with reviews, the nation’s first nuclear energy plant will probably be constructed close to Lake Balkhash within the Almaty area.

Constructing nuclear energy vegetation is expensive, and a few analysts say the price of developing unit could possibly be roughly $5 billion. Further prices embrace storage and disposal of radioactive waste, in addition to the next dismantling of exhausted reactors a long time later.